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| (With thanks to http://www.foxfirefiber.com/newsletter.html - accessed 17.03.13) |
Steve Levy, of Mount Pleasant Baptist Church in Swansea, recently preached a sermon …on preaching! … In which he emphasised how the words of a good sermon will certainly sound foolish, as it is the power of God that saves, not the power of the preacher ... so I would like to start by praying!
[Pray]
I’d like to read what I think is an excellent example of words that sound foolish to us, but that come in the power of God!
Revelation 6:15-17 says:
Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”
… So, the kings of the earth, great leaders, war heroes, the rich, the famous, the powerful, the influential - everyone, in fact – will, it is prophesied, resort to talking to inanimate mountains and rocks (who, it must be remembered, don't have a long history of engaging Man in conversation!) in a desperate attempt to find protection from the terrible wrath of ... a small, bleating, wobbly-legged, bundle of wool!
If that didn't sound foolish enough, Revelation 5:13 adds:
...every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them (say) “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honour and glory and might for ever and ever!”
Again, I get the 'him who sits on the throne' bit – getting honour and glory ‘n’ all - but ... the LAMB? What is this fixation with the young and ovine all about?
John the Baptist gives us the short answer in John 1:29-34:
...he saw Jesus ... and said, “Behold, the lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.’ … I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him … I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”
The slightly longer answer will take us through some of the history of God's interaction with his people. We're going to follow this little study on the lamb, stopping off very briefly in Genesis 22, Exodus 11-12, Isaiah 53, and Mark 14-15, but focussing mainly on The Passover and The Cross.
So, first of all Genesis 22:1-8:
... God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!”
And he said, “Here am I.”
He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”
So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went, both of them, together.
And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!”
And he said, “Here am I, my son.”
He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”
Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.
So, here, we have a father and his son; the son is called his 'only son' whom the father loves; it's early in the morning when the son is led out with two other men, the wood upon which the son is to be sacrificed placed on his own back; and, on the third day, the father confidently reports that his son will return after the sacrifice.
Sound familiar?! If we needed any more help as to what this event was prophesying, Solomon provides it, in 2 Chronicles 3:1, as he starts "to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem (which is) on Mount Moriah"
Interestingly, here, Abraham prophesies that The Lord himself will provide a lamb for the sacrifice ... yet THIS time, in verse 13, a ram is provided.
But let's get back to lambs!
Next we're into Exodus 11-12 and The Passover. To preserve you from my voice for the next quarter-hour, Katy’s going to read a slightly abridged version, just leaving out repetitions or points not related to the lamb specifically:
The Lord said to Moses, “Yet one plague more I will bring upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt ... About midnight I will go out in the midst of Egypt, and every firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, even to the firstborn of the slave girl who is behind the handmill, and all the firstborn of the cattle. There shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as there has never been, nor ever will be again.
But not a dog shall growl against any of the people of Israel, either man or beast, that you may know that the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel.
This month shall be for you the beginning of months … the first month of the year for you ... on the tenth day of this month every man shall take a lamb according to their fathers' houses, a lamb for a household ... according to what each can eat ... Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male a year old ... and you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight. Then they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. They shall eat the flesh that night, roasted on the fire; with unleavened bread and bitter herbs ... you shall eat it with your belt fastened, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand and you shall eat it in haste.
For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgements: I am the Lord. The blood shall be a sign for you, on the houses where you are ... when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you, when I strike the land of Egypt.
Moses expands on the instructions a little:
Take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood … and touch the lintel and the two doorposts.
None of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning. For the Lord will pass through to strike the Egyptians, and when he sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the door and will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you.
Then, it happened:
At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon, and all the firstborn of the livestock. And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he and all his servants and all the Egyptians. And there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was not a house where someone was not dead.
So, again, as with Abraham’s story, it’s Firstborn Son vs. Lamb!
The gods of Egypt, representing all gods that are not the one, true, living God, are about to be judged by the one, true, living God, and every household who align themselves to, or worship, these false gods will live only at the cost of their firstborn son.
But the one, true, living God - being the God of love as he is - has offered an alternative: a lamb. “There was not a house where someone was not dead” after The Lord had passed through … the question was, would that dead ‘someone’ be a son or a lamb?
As it represented Jesus, this lamb had to be without blemish (representing Jesus’ being without evil); it had to be male (representing Jesus being the self-sacrificing Bridegroom to his Bride); and it had to be a year old (representing Jesus’ having completed his appointed time of ministry before his own sacrificial death).
On the tenth day of the first month, the lamb was taken into the household for whose salvation it was to be sacrificed, and kept there, inside, until the fourteenth day of this month. For five days, then, this farm animal lived in the house as ‘one of the family’. This represents how Jesus came in our flesh to make his home amongst us (and, for those who like numerology, perhaps the five days represents Jesus’ showing, during that time, that he fulfilled The Law?)
The whole assembly of the congregation of Israel then kill their lambs “at twilight”, or – as an alternative translation puts it - “between the two evenings”, which is an odd phrase that possibly refers to the two evenings that occurred on the day Jesus died, as reported in Matthew 27, Mark 15, and Luke 23. Here, night-time fell at around noon, and the light only reappeared at 3pm, at which time Jesus gave up his spirit. The Israelites then eat the flesh of the lamb, personally identifying with the saving work achieved by the sacrifice.
This offer of a lamb was a true gift from God - a “Get out of jail free” card, for those familiar with the board game ‘Monopoly’ - and, if a household heard God’s call, through Moses, to take this gift he offers, trusted that he is as good as his word, and showed their trust on their lintels and their doorposts, their own firstborn son would be spared.
Individual status would not be taken into account: “every firstborn … from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne … to the firstborn of the slave … the firstborn of the captive … in the dungeon, and all the firstborn of the livestock” would die. No, this is all about faith – do you trust God or not? It’s black or white; there is no grey area here – it’s a simple yes or no. And the Lord makes a very clear distinction between those who do trust him and those who do not.
But what does trusting him actually look like in this situation?
I want to introduce you to three hypothetical Israelite households living in Goshen that night…
Meet the Cohens: they are very religious – they’re always inviting Moses over to have him share the words of God; they’re always praying and talking to each other about Father Abraham and singing spiritual songs; and they’re always doing good deeds around the neighbourhood for the widows and orphans. On one level, they’re quite disappointed about The Passover: they don’t want God to pass over them, they’d like him to come in, examine their lives, and they’d like to hear the words “well done, good and faithful servant!” On the other hand, a command is a command, and they follow obediently, carefully putting down two coats of lamb’s blood around their door.
Not like the Fagins: they weren’t going to be going anywhere that night anyway because their whole family had been served ASBOs. They are commonly known as being drunkards, gluttons, liars, gamblers, swindlers, benefits cheats, notoriously promiscuous … they avoid Moses like the plague (if you’ll pardon the pun) so it’s only by fortune that they’ve heard what he said about the lamb’s blood anyway, and they really don’t think it will do any good because they’re sure that the Angel of Death has had their card marked from a long time ago. But, equally, they’ve nothing to lose by doing it, and there is the possibility that God will be merciful if they obey this once, so they splash the basin of blood on the lintel and doorposts.
Then there’s the Leaveys: they’re not as wicked as the Fagins, but then they’re nothing like as good as the Cohens either. They keep phoning up the Cohens saying “ok, we’ve killed the lamb and we think we’ve applied the blood the way we’re supposed to, but we’re not sure – could you spy through your window over the street and say what you think? … And do we really think it will make the difference? What if the Angel of Death doesn’t see it, I mean it will be dark out there!...” … they pace up and down all night wondering if they’ve done enough and done it right enough …but, nonetheless, the blood is around the door.
… So, which of these families will end up with the dead son in the morning?
None of them! If the blood was on the door, God wouldn’t look in to check on any further details, he would stay the destroyer’s hand and move on to the next house. It had nothing to do with the moral character, standing in society, or even the state of heart or mind of the people inside the house, and everything to do with the presence of the blood on the door. It was the fact that the blood was there that gave full protection from any further scrutiny.
It wasn’t even about how much faith they had in the blood – he never mentioned doubts, fears, worries, and concerns – he didn’t discuss how the people were to feel about it at all! He simply asks to be trusted to know what he is doing. You could have been as doubt-filled and concerned as you like but if the blood was on the door, no-one was coming in.
In stark contrast to what we normally hear from the pulpit (or, frankly, from any other would-be teacher), it wasn’t about what was on the inside that counted, but what was on the outside!
This resonates with the idea of Christ’s righteousness cloaking our nakedness as we stand before the judgement seat, such that the Judge looks at us and, only seeing Jesus, pronounces us innocent.
Salvation is nothing to do with your own performance and everything to do with Jesus’. Christ saves you by His blood – not by anything in you. It’s not about the quality of your living, speaking, acting, praying. It’s not even about the quality of your own faith. It’s only about the blood. It’s the quality of His death, not the quality of your life. 1 John 1:7 says “the blood of Jesus, God’s Son, purifies us from EVERY sin” – no sin can get past this purification.
We just need to remember to hold up this gift of the blood (alone) in our defence in the face of the judgement.
But, therein, lies a huge problem: we, as human beings, are invariably forgetful! This is why the Bible and creation are littered with reminders – in fact, the Bible is not a book about doing so much as remembering.
And so, in this case, God calls for a regular reminder (Exodus 12:14-20):
This day shall be for you a memorial day and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord … you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day, throughout your generations, as a statute for ever.
Interestingly, it is not called the Feast of The Lamb, or even the Feast of The Lamb and Unleavened Bread, as you might expect from the prominent place lamb has on the Passover menu. It’s just the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
For those who are saved, Jesus was The Lamb who was sacrificed once for all so that no further sacrifice is required.
On the night that he was betrayed (the day he was to become The Passover Lamb), Jesus appears to change the Passover meal for all future years, from the eating of the lamb, proclaiming his sacrifice that buys freedom, to the breaking and eating of bread in remembrance that he had given his body to be broken in our place, and to the drinking of wine, in remembrance that his life was poured out in our place.
I said I’d go through Genesis 22, Exodus 11-12, Isaiah 53, and Mark 14-15, focussing mainly on The Passover and The Cross. I’ve done half of this – if you’ll allow me, I’ll go through the second half next week.
In the meantime, if you have tasted of Jesus and seen that he is good, please take and eat communion with us this morning in remembrance that he died and was raised to eternal life so that we might live with him for eternity.
Before we do, let me thank God as we pray together: Father, thank you for your son, who - doing only as he saw you do – sacrificed himself in order that we might be with you forevermore. Help us always to remember, to remind others, and to be reminded by others about your love for us, your wisdom for us, and your power for us. Help us to be content in all things, living life to the full, knowing and enjoying you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
